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MTA Set to Introduce $104 MetroCard

Tuesday, October 05, 2010

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It’s (nearly) official: Monthly MetroCards will go up a whopping 17 percent in January, from $89 to $104.

Speaking on WNYC’s Brian Lehrer Show this morning, MTA Chairman Jay Walder says that the MTA would keep monthly MetroCards unlimited, but raise the price to $104.

The authority had considered raising the cost to $99—but limiting the number of riders people could take with the cards to 90 each month. But participants at public hearings said they disliked that idea.

Weekly MetroCards will also stay unlimited, Walder says, but will rise more modestly from $27 to $29 (a 7 percent increase). Walder says that the disproportionate increase was a way to even out the benefits of each card.

“The discounts that we give on the monthly pass are much steeper than the discounts that we give on the weekly pass,” Walder says. “At the same time, if you look at the income level of the people who buy weekly passes and monthly passes, more lower income people buy weekly passes than monthly passes. So we sought to be able to limit the increases on those fare options that lower income people use the most.”

Single-fare tickets will now cost $2.50, though riders using pay-per-ride MetroCards will still be charged $2.25 per swipe.

The MTA will make those recommendations official in a vote Thursday morning. The new fares will take effect January 1.

According to materials posted on MTA's website, the board will also be asked to reduce the bonus that riders receive when they put a certain amount of money on their MetroCards, from 15 percent to 7 percent. The threshold for the bonus will also go up, from $8 to $10.

The $5.50 express bus fare will stay at $5.50, but weekly express bus MetroCards will go up from $45 to $50.

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